Sportradar Security Services, a subsidiary of sports data provider Sportradar, has signed an agreement with Italy’s second-highest football division Serie B to provide education workshops and e-learning packages to all clubs on the dangers of match-fixing.

The agreement runs for the next two season and will see Sportradar organise workshops and teaching modules for the senior and youth teams of each of Serie B’s 22 clubs. The programmes are designed to help all participants understand why match-fixing is a growing problem, how fixers approach players and officials, and the consequences of the offence.

The e-learning tutorials will support and supplement the workshops to ensure that each participant understands what they have learned.

Serie B president Andrea Abodi said the deal highlighted the whole of Italian football’s commitment to honesty and integrity.

“The most important asset of football are its supporters,” Abodi explained. “Deceiving football supporters means deceiving the whole football world. That is the reason why knowledge and training about match fixing is essential for Serie B‘s credibility, and is fundamental to ensuring our stadiums are full.”

“I would like to underline how important teamwork is to ensuring the effective defeat of match-fixing, and our key ally is Sportradar, which already collaborates with many other football associations worldwide,” he added.

Sportradar’s managing director of integrity and strategy Andreas Krannich said the agreement would support the work of his company’s Fraud Detection System, which monitors all matches in Italy’s five professional football leagues.

“This exclusive agreement means that our unparalleled integrity education services will reach all 102 professional clubs in Italy,” he explained. “We could not be prouder that all of these stakeholders have shown this level of trust in us and we will ensure that professional football in this country gets the most informed, joined up and credible information and insight possible.”

Sportradar launched a similar programme for Italy’s top football division, Serie A, in October last year. It kicked off with a ‘national integrity tour’, starting with educational workshops for the AC Milan and FC Internazionale Milano youth squads.